


Flexible, Friendly, and Adaptable

by MsCee



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: A busload of 13 year olds, Alive Laura Hale, Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Teachers, Because science and reasons, Conservation Biologist Derek, M/M, Namely because conservation biology is So Hot, Or is that just me, School Trip, Teacher Derek, Tour Guide Stiles, Travel, Yeah thats probably just me, only a fleeting mention though
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-16
Updated: 2013-07-16
Packaged: 2017-12-20 10:22:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,294
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/886132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MsCee/pseuds/MsCee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>As a tour guide, Stiles liked to think that he embodied his company’s motto of being flexible, friendly, and adaptable. As a teacher chaperone, Derek Hale’s ethos seemed more along the lines of ‘inflexible, unfriendly, and rigid as hell’. Clearly, they were going to get along swimmingly. </p>
<p>(Wherein Stiles is a tour guide to Derek Hale's 8th grade class, and amidst the drama and chaos that is thirty teenagers on an overnight trip, falls in love with the grumpy teacher. Well, maybe not love, but he certainly entertains a solid number of fantasies about stroking Derek's eyebrows. With his tongue. Is that creepy? Yeah, that is definitely creepy.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Flexible, Friendly, and Adaptable

**Author's Note:**

> Once upon a time, in a pique of poor judgement, I accepted a job as a tour guide. I spent a few summers leading 13 year olds through the nation's capital on week long trips. 
> 
> It was not pretty. 
> 
> The student characters in this fic are strongly inspired by my actual experiences, and the experiences of my colleagues. Meaning that kids have actually said/done this (or similar) shit to us. 
> 
> That being said, I never banged a teacher.

Stiles took pride in being a fantastic tour guide. He had never lost a kid, always knew their names by the second day, and he had once led an impromptu walking tour of a city he’d never been to before after the art museum was evacuated unexpectedly during a visit. He was the best damned tour guide his company had, and he was so not down with the idea of breaking his guide-of-the-month winning streak.

Which is why having Derek Hale step onto his bus was a teensy bit problematic.

Derek was the stuff of legends around the office. Stiles had never met him, nor seen him, but he was picturing some Henry Cavill look-alike from how the girls (and some of the guys) went on. No less than three guides (and one of them a very attractive dude, putting stop to the ‘maybe he’s just gay’ gossip) had been put on suspension for sexually harassing the fabled teacher, all of them reported by Derek himself. Because as much as he was apparently gorgeous, most of the office gossip revolved around the fact that Derek Hale was the surliest, no-nonsense rule-abider in the history of cold-hearted heartbreakers.

Frankly, Stiles hadn’t given much thought to Derek. Derek being unseducable didn’t bother Stiles, since the ‘nerdy-cute’ look that Stiles was serving up did not usually appeal to stone-cold-hot model types anyway. When Stiles saw Derek’s name on his itinerary, he hadn’t even _thought_ about Derek’s supposed crazy-making hotness. He just planned on being professional and showing the teacher that the company _did_ have guides who didn’t want in his pants.

But then Derek Hale stepped onto his bus and all of Stiles’ plans to be professional went out the window.

Because _hot motherfucking damn_ , Stiles wanted in his pants.

“Class.” Derek didn’t even use a microphone. He just spoke loudly in a clear, authoritative tone that Stiles immediately began casting in his spank bank material.

The thirty-odd kids on the bus settled down, turning from their conversations to face their intrepid leader.

“Thank you all for being on time. We’re waiting on Ms. Reyes currently, who is just inside signing a few papers. Before I let your guide speak with you, I’d like to remind you that this trip is a privilege, not a right. As such, it can be taken away at any time for inappropriate behavior. I expect you to behave as you would in your classroom. Any misbehavior could lead to your being sent home, and potentially suspended on top of that. Mr. Stilinski, do you have anything to add to the students?”

Stiles blinked twice, limbs jerking at being startled from listening to Derek’s voice. It was higher than he would have expected, but smooth and stern and just about hand-tailored to make Stiles as uncomfortable and tongue-tied as possible.

“Uh, call me Stiles,” he replied, recovering from his flail and picking up his microphone.

Derek’s mouth set in a thin line.

“Mr. Stilinski.” He repeated firmly, looking at Stiles like he was a kid being told off.

Well, at least those office rumors weren’t exaggerated. Dude was a grump. Stiles was inexplicably ruffled at being snubbed so soon. The rational part of him got it, Derek wanted to establish professional boundaries. But the irrational part (well, the sort-of irrational part. The completely irrational part wanted to climb Derek like a tree, but he was steadfastedly ignoring _that_ part) wanted Derek to at least wait for Stiles to make a good impression before shutting him down.

“Good morning, sports racers!” Stiles called as his microphone switched on. “I hope you’re all as excited about this trip as I am. Before we start, I’ve got a few ground rules I have to go through, so lend me your ears and we’ll breeze through ‘em real quick. After that I’m going to come around and get to know you a little better, since we’ll be best buds for the five days.”

Stiles ran down his rules quickly, making sure to repeat the more important rules lest anyone use the whole ‘I didn’t hear you tell me to respect curfew’ excuse. At the end, he opened the floor for questions. A kid in a grey shirt shot his hand up.

“Yes?” Stiles asked, pointing to him.

“Are you a virgin?” The kid called forward.

Stiles puffed out his cheeks and rolled his eyes.

So it was going to be _that_ kind of tour.

He was about to quip back with something sarcastic, as he normally did when kids got mouthy, but Derek beat him to it, standing up and literally _zooming_ over to the kid’s seat.

“Casey.” He said flatly.

“Sir?” The kid, Casey apparently, had the good graces to look sheepish.

“Apologize _now_ to Mr. Stilinski. You will be eating with the teachers at the first rest stop, and if I hear you disrespecting anyone else I will personally see that you are sent home immediately. Are we understood?”

“Yes, Sir.”

Derek nodded shortly and returned to his seat at the front.

Stiles’s heart fluttered. Had Derek just _defended his honor_ from a 13-year-old punk? Be still his heart, it must be love.

Or something.

“Uh, thanks, dude,” Stiles muttered when Derek sat down.

Derek shot him a quelling look and nodded brusquely, then immediately stared out the other window.

Ooo-kay.

So Derek was not exactly the communicative type.

Stiles could work with that.

He’d just have to win him over by talking enough for the two of ‘em.

Wait, did he say win him over?

He totally meant professionally. Win over his opinion of the company. Obviously. Not Stiles. Stiles was going to be a professional. Stiles was not going to hit on Derek or try to win him over or-

Oh, fuck it.

Stiles was screwed.

*

The first rest stop was a McDonald’s four hours out of town. Stiles counted the kids as they filed out of the bus, trying to remember their names as they bounced towards the restaurant.

Derek was the last out, walking stiffly beside one of the other teachers on the trip, a busty blonde with an entirely predatory smile. Erica Reyes, Stiles’s brain supplied as he watched her sashay into the McDonald’s. Stiles watched as Derek muttered something to her, his ever-present frown deepening slightly. She laughed brightly, her smile widening as she patted him on the shoulder and walked ahead of him.

Stiles wondered what Derek had said to her. He bet that Derek was wickedly funny under that scowl, sarcastic and dry and witty. Or maybe he wasn’t, maybe he was really all intensity and serious frowning, and Stiles could roll with that too.

As a guide, obviously. Stiles could roll with that as a guide, to tailor the tour to Derek and make it as fun as possible. No other rolling was going to happen, Stiles informed himself sternly. He was not going to think about rolling as it pertained to Derek Hale. And whoops, too late, Stiles’s thought train was taking a happy little detour all the places he was determined to not let it wander. Rolling with Derek made him think of rolling in the hay which made him think of horses which made him think of Derek on a horse which made him think of riding Derek and woah, too far, no imagining nudity in a McDonald’s parking lot. 

Stiles was so busy trying with every bit of consciousness he owned to think of _anything_ other than Derek naked that he didn’t notice the door swing shut right before he approached it, and collided head on with a glass panel emblazoned with the McDonald’s logo.

“Ow.” Stiles muttered, furtively casting a glance inside with the vain hope that none of the students saw his spectacular collision. Thirty faces were absorbed in burgers and gossip, none of them any the wiser that their tour guide was the biggest klutz on the planet. Derek and Erica, however, were a different story. Derek was staring at him like he was an alien, while Erica was doing a very bad job of not laughing at him.

Laughing at, he could handle. Judgey McAngryFace’s judging disapproval, however, was another story. Stiles rubbed a hand across the back of his neck sheepishly, entering the restaurant and looking everywhere but at Derek and Erica.

“Should we be worried for the safety of the students, Stiles?” Erica called out to him as he approached them beside the counter.

“Nah, I’m only really a danger to myself.” He shot back. She laughed, grinning at him, and Stiles let out a breath. The teachers on his tours didn’t always appreciate his kidding around, but he got the sense that Erica was pretty laid back.

Unlike her colleague, who was rocking a pretty impressive serial killer face and did not look amused in the least.  

“You going to come eat with us?” She asked, gesturing vaguely behind herself to a table that already sat Lydia, the other teacher chaperone, a pretty redhead with pouty lips dressed in a prim pencil skirt and striped blouse.

Jesus, nobody had warned him that _every_ teacher at this school moonlighted as a supermodel.

“Uh, I… I normally eat by myself, and walk around to check on the kids.” Stiles couldn’t help his gaze from shifting to Derek. He hoped his face didn’t transparently project the bizarre mashup of terror and embarrassment that he was currently feeling. Erica waved him off.

“Please, they’re stuffing their faces with fries, they don’t need to be checked on. Besides, Derek said that Casey needs to apologize to you, and he’s sitting with us for lunch as a punishment.”  

Stiles glanced at the front of the restaurant, where Casey was ordering his food, then back over to Derek, as though to check the validity of Erica’s statement. Derek’s face revealed nothing, except for maybe a desire to chuck Stiles out the restaurant window and carry out the week without a tour guide.

“I usually try to avoid being stared down while I eat, though, so I think I’m going to have to pass.” Stiles blurted out. Holy hell, he was really out to lose his job, wasn’t he? Cardinal rule of guiding, never insult your teachers _to their face_ before you’ve even arrived at your destination. Derek’s face darkened, and the man turned away with a scowl, muttering something else to Erica before storming off to the teacher’s table.

“Sorry about him,” Erica said with a shrug after he was out of earshot. “He really doesn’t like these tours.”

“Can’t blame him, from some of the stories I’ve heard.” Stiles replied frankly. “Has he ever actually been happy with one of our guides?”

“In the four years I’ve been at the school? Nope. I’ve never made it through one of these trips without him completely losing his shit at your colleagues.” She paused, and gave Stiles an appraising look. “Mind you, they’re normally all flirty and insufferable, not to mention persistent. Maybe you’ll be the first to take no for an answer, and we won’t have to spend an hour yelling at your boss about hiring vapid bimbos.”

“Take no for an answer?” Stiles scoffed, personally affronted that he be classed in the same category as his predatory colleagues. “I don’t remember asking a _question_.”

Erica’s grin ripened, and she gave him a last, meaningful look before stepping forward to order her food. Stiles felt vaguely unsettled, already regretting his snappy comeback. Because who was he trying to kid? He was literally two seconds away from climbing over the table and stroking Derek’s eyebrows.

With his tongue.

Was that creepy?

Yeah, that was _definitely_ creepy.

*

They rolled into their destination just after dark, and Stiles settled the students into their rooms with only minimal fuss and three roommate changes. With Erica flanking his side so he could knock on the girls’ rooms, he checked to make sure everyone was where they ought to be, reminding them that breakfast was at seven the next morning.

They all nodded at his quick list of bedtime rules, clearly not listening to him talk and not fooling him in the least. He could practically _see_ their eyes glaze over as they tuned him out to think about their upcoming night calling their friends’ rooms, messing around on the hotel TV to find the most inappropriate thing available, and consuming junk food in obscene quantities.

Ah, to be young again.

After his rounds, Stiles met the night security guard and passed over the class and room lists, then with a last look over at Derek’s firmly shut door at the end of the hall, headed towards his own room. He didn’t even want to address the purpose of that glance towards Derek’s door. His new tactic to handling Derek Hale was complete avoidance and resolute denial, after all. What had he even been hoping for? That Derek’s door was going to be open, the man standing at the threshold crooking a finger to beckon Stiles in?

Stiles shook his head to clear it of the unfortunately appealing idea and hurried a little faster to the elevator.

This was getting out of hand, and he hadn’t even spent a full day with the man.

Not to mention, he was yet to actually _speak a word to him_.

As soon as he collapsed onto his bed, Stiles pulled out his company cellphone to see if there were any texts waiting. He knew Scott, his best friend and fellow tour guide, was leading a tour in the same city this week, and they normally pulled strings with the other guides to be able to room together if they were at the same hotel. Sure enough, there was a text waiting for him from Scott.

_Did you get in today? I’m on day 2 staying at the Crowne room 516._

Stiles grinned as he read his own hotel room on his phone’s screen.

_Funny that, I also seem to be staying at the Crowne room 516. What a coincidence. :P_ Stiles texted back.

_Awesome! Will be up soon two girls missing from my group :S_

Stiles shook his head with a bemused smile as he tossed the phone aside. Scott was one of the nicest people on the planet, a trait that often had his tour groups trying to see how far they could push him before he lost his temper.

Little did they know, Scott didn’t actually _have_ a temper to lose. His good-natured optimism was not just put on like some of their colleagues’; he was legitimately that nice. So when he lost kids (which he did a lot, considering), he just smiled his dopey smile and recovered them, then cheerily ambled onwards to the next activity.

Stiles went over the next day’s itinerary while he waited for Scott to wrangle his kids, annotating it with his thoughts of the group from their bus ride up. They were scheduled to have a walking tour through old town the next day, Stiles read with a grin. It was perfect, he scribbled in the margins, because old town had the best ghost stories and the boys on this group seemed especially full of preteen swagger and false bravado.

It wouldn’t last long through one of Stiles’s ghost stories, that was for sure.

Soon enough, the door to his room clicked open and Stiles skimmed over his notes one last time before setting them aside.

The name ‘Derek’ jumped out at him at least fifteen times down the page.

“Ugh.” Stiles announced, not even looking up at Scott as the dark-haired man flung himself across the room’s second bed.

“Isn’t that my line?” Scott asked.

“I’m with Derek Hale’s school.” Stiles replied, his eyes still stuck somewhere between _Does Derek like sci centers? Switch w/ bot garden?_ and _I bet Derek will appreciate mythology tour b/c kids are always into it._

“Is he as hot as everyone says?” Stiles looked up at Scott in time to see his friend scrunch his nose, as if the very idea of finding Derek attractive was offensive to his heterosexuality.

“Hotter.”

“Is he as mean as everyone says?”

Stiles thumped his pen down on top of a restaurant menu with the note ‘ _Erica says Derek doesn’t like Italian call ahead swap out standard lasgn for chkn pot pie?’_

“Meaner.” Stiles sighed, hanging his head miserably.

“Would it make you feel better if I told you that I have three girls in my group who giggle every time I look at them?”

Stiles couldn’t help the bubble of laughter that escaped from him.

“You always have girls giggling at you, Scotty boy.” Stiles pointed out. It was the curse of being a male tour guide, and especially one as cute as Scott. Objectively cute, of course. Something about knowing a guy through his paste-eating years ruined his sexual appeal permanently, which suited Stiles fine since Scott was definitely not his type.

Stiles’s type was a lot scowlier. Also, unobtainable. Stiles was pretty exclusively attracted to people who would never in a million years return his affections.   

“Yeah, but I don’t mean just a bit of giggling. They don’t calm down for a full five minutes, Stiles. It got in the way of my tour today, because they wouldn’t stop long enough for me to finish explaining a monument.”

“Did you tell them off?”

“’Course not!” Scott looked positively scandalized by the suggestion. “I waited.”

“Of course you did.” Stiles’s eye roll was one of his best, if he did say so himself. “No wonder they keep giggling at you.”

“You think they don’t take me seriously?”

“Nobody takes you seriously. You’re like a puppy dog. Adorable, but completely unthreatening.”

Scott’s brow furrowed as he considered Stiles’s words.

“So you think I should be more like Derek Hale?” Scott said finally, his mouth quirking into a lopsided smile.

Stiles didn’t reply with words, instead opting for the closest approximation to the sound of a moose being shot through with a harpoon that a human being could make.

“What am I going to _do_ , Scott? Do you know how many words he said to me on the bus today? None. Exactly _zero_. And I tried to engage him in conversation, I really did, and both of the other teachers were super talkative, but Derek? Not a goddamned _word_ out of him!”

Scott shrugged.

“There isn’t much you _can_ do, is there? I mean, he doesn’t like you, but not all teachers have to love you. You should just stay out of his way until the tour ends, and focus on the other teachers, right?”

Stiles narrowed his eyes at his friend, who did not seem to be grasping the gravity of the situation.

“That was originally the plan,” Stiles hissed, hoping his crazy eyes were sufficiently crazy to impress upon Scott that everything was officially Out Of Control with capital letters. “That was the plan until Derek had to go and be _so hot and mysterious that now all I want is to crack him like a walnut and suck out the juices._ ”

“Uh, that’s not really how walnuts work?”

“Not the point, Scott!”

“Well, what else do you want me to say to that?” Scott yelped.

“Express your sympathy for my inevitable doom like a good best friend would?”

“Doom is a little dramatic. ”

“When did you get so reasonable? Seriously, I don’t think you are grasping the magnitude of this problem. Guides get in trouble for seducing Derek. Derek hates guides who try to seduce him. I want to seduce him. QED, Derek is going to hate me and report me and I will lose this job and then I will just be another unemployed twenty-two year old with an anthropology degree and no future, Scott _. Do you want me to have no future, Scott?_ ”

**“** Wait, so you were harassing Derek already?”

“No, of course not! I don’t want to _harass_ him like those other guides. I’m nothing like them! They just wanted in his pants. I don’t want that. Well, I do, but I don’t just want to sleep with him. I want to _woo_ him. I want to get to _know_ him.”

“I’m so confused.”

“You usually are.” Stiles nodded agreeably.

“Let me get this straight - ”

Stiles snorted, and Scott shot him a quelling look that failed miserably. He looked more like a floppy kitten begging to be cuddled.

“So you like Derek, and want to get to know him. But you’re afraid that if you try, he’ll assume you’re harassing him and report you like he did the other guides?”

Stiles nodded miserably. He wanted to prove to Derek that he was different, that he actually wanted to be Derek’s _friend_. But how could he, when Derek was a suspicious, grumpy bastard and Stiles did technically have a hidden agenda of wanting to see him naked?

Wait, hold up.

What if he _didn’t_ want to see Derek naked? Or, at least, what if Derek thought he didn’t want to see Derek naked? Then all that would be left was an annoying, persistent tour guide that was 100% un-reportable.

Yes, Derek would hate every minute of it. Unless, of course, he started _wanting_ to be around Stiles. Unless Stiles was _so good_ at getting to know Derek that Derek started _appreciating_ his presence, and maybe even gave him a decent performance review.

“Scott!” Stiles crowed triumphantly. “I have the best idea!”

“That’s never good.” Scott groaned.

“I, my dear Scott, am going to frienduce Derek Hale.”

“Uh, what?”

“Frienduce! You know, the irresistible progeny of friending and seducing! I am going to make him want to be my friend like he’s wanted nothing else in his life. This plan is – ”

“Doomed to fail?” Scott interrupted. Stiles waved him off.

“Whatever, man. It’s flawless. And on that note, I think I’m going to go for a quick swim before I hit the sack. You know, cool off and clear my head. I need it.”

Scott nodded, because it was the truth. Besides, he knew Stiles loved swimming to de-stress on tours. Stiles sighed a final time as he rummaged through his duffle bag for his trunks and a worn t-shirt. He snagged a small towel from the bathroom on his way out the door, not bothering to bring a change of clothes. Nobody would be up at the pool this late anyway, that was the whole point. 

*

Stiles swam for nearly an hour, until his fingers were pruned and his body was hot even against the cold water.

He climbed out and dried himself off before shrugging on his t-shirt and moving towards the door into the fitness center and out to the lobby. He had the door halfway opened when he heard a familiar voice from inside, presumably on the phone if the one-sided conversation was any indication.

“I already told you how… Laura! Do you ever listen to me?”

Stiles whirled around to locate the voice’s owner, and saw Derek standing at the other side of the fitness room with a cellphone to his ear. Derek was wearing a white wifebeater and grey sweatpants slung low enough to give Stiles the vapors.

“-Laura… Okay, fine. Just… Yeah, I get it. Okay. Bye. Love you too.” Derek sounded annoyed, but instead of the tight irritation that he permeated around Stiles, it was the same fond annoyance that Stiles had noticed him take around his students. The kind of annoyance that made it obvious that for all he was a grumpy sourpuss, Derek cared a lot, and maybe even secretly liked being annoyed.

The thought made Stiles unreasonably happy. Also upset, because everything he learned about Derek made him more intriguing, instead of just proving him to be some attractive douchebag that Stiles could pass over without a second thought.

Derek hung up his phone with a sigh, and Stiles cleared his throat to let Derek know he wasn’t alone in the room. Derek frowned at him as Stiles walked forward, flip flops thwacking awkwardly loudly against the floor.

“Girlfriend?” Stiles asked with what he hoped was a nonchalant nod towards Derek’s cellphone.

Derek’s eyes flit down Stiles’s front, probably judging him for walking around in a damp t-shirt and swim trunks still saturated with water despite his best efforts to dry off. He realized belatedly that it probably hadn’t been a good idea to leave his change of clothes upstairs, because it was technically against the rules to be around teachers out of his standard company polo shirt and khakis. He hoped Derek wasn’t going to report him for being out of uniform, especially since he could totally see other guides pulling the same stint to try to entice Derek with pool-sanctioned partial nudity. Well, Derek could shove it, because the hotel didn’t even have a change room, so what else was Stiles supposed to do?

“No.” Derek’s response startled Stiles out of his tangent, and it took his brain a second to get back on track and remember what question Derek was actually answering.

“Oh. Um – ”

“Sister.” Derek continued, and Stiles nodded. It was single words, yes, and Derek’s tone was clearly indicating that this was the end of the conversation, but hey, he could have flat out ignored Stiles, so all told he’d count it as a win.

“Ah.” Stiles bobbed his head, choosing to ignore the fact that Derek was trying to glare him out of the room. “You two close?”

Derek didn’t answer for a second, frowning deeply. Stiles jammed his hands into his pockets, unsure of what else to do with himself. Unsure of why he was still in the room, frankly, since Derek pretty obviously did not want to talk to him.

“Yup.” Derek grunted, and Stiles’s heart fluttered irrationally at the fact that Derek _had_ _actually answered him_.

“Cool. Must be nice. Having a sibling, I mean. I’m an only child. Is it just you two?”

Derek glared again, but it was less venomous than his previous Glares of Doom. Either Stiles was cracking through, or Derek was getting lazy with the eyebrows.

“No.”

Stiles huffed a breath. Well, this was pretty much exactly what he imagined running into a brick wall repeatedly would feel like.

“Come on, dude. Give me something, before I feel like a total tool for standing here and forcing you to play 20 questions.” As soon as the words left his mouth, Stiles bit back a small ‘eep’ and prayed to every deity he could name that Derek wasn’t about to call his boss on the spot to have him fired. But hey, never let it be said that Stiles Stilinski half-assed anything he did. Harassing a sinfully attractive teacher at the risk of potentially losing his job was not the kind of thing you committed to without willing to go all the way.  

Derek’s eyebrows did a complicated little waggle at Stiles’s comment. Stiles chose to interpret it as ‘ _well you’re free to leave any time you like, if you aren’t happy with my preverbal grunted answers’_.

“Yeah,” Stiles sighed, responding as though the eyebrows had actually spoken aloud. “But apparently I don’t want to leave. Maybe I like pretending I’m talking to a caveman?”

Derek’s eyebrows flipped to ‘begrudgingly impressed’, which Stiles completely deserved, thank you very much, because speaking eyebrow was not an easily acquired skill. It had taken a whole bus ride of watching Derek interact with the different personalities of each of his students for Stiles to pick up as much as he did.

For research, not to be creepy.

He had creepy covered by making sure he got off the bus after Derek at every rest stop so that he could stare at the man’s ass in dress-code-violating-ly tight denim.

Derek’s eyebrows were still trying to engage him in conversation, asking him how he knew what Derek was thinking. Like he was _that_ complicated to figure out.

Puh-lease. Three more days and Stiles would have his number.

His figurative number, that is, not his telephone number. Because Stiles was being professional and not hitting on Derek, remember? No numbers were being exchanged. Ever.

Stiles tried to reroute his thoughts from the unbidden image of calling Derek at midnight, coiling the phone cord around his finger and teasing him about something frivolous. Wait, hold on. Did his mind think it was 1998? Who the hell still had cords on their phones? Stiles didn’t even _have_ a landline, he just had his iPhone. Seriously, he needed to spend some time working on the technological plausibility of his fantasies.

Oh, Derek’s eyebrows were still waiting for an answer. Stiles waved his hand in the vague direction of Derek’s face.

“I know you think single syllables count as entire conversations, but your owlbrows seem to disagree. They speak in poetry. In ballad. In their own language, pretty much. Which is totally cool, dude, since I love learning new languages.”

Derek’s lips twitched before schooling back into a thin line.

“Owl brows?”

“Oh, yeah. You’ve got serious eyebrows, dude. Like a horned owl’s. Y’know, all – ” Stiles broke off to waggle his fingers in a ‘V’ near his forehead, then nodded firmly. “Owlbrows,” he repeated, like his explanation had made any sense.

But apparently Derek and his owlbrows got it, because one climbed to his hairline like he was considering Stiles’s very valid logic.

Or like Stiles was insane.

Hey, he never claimed to be bilingual.

“I have two sisters. Laura and Cora.” Derek announced suddenly, and woah, were they actually conversing? Had Stiles finally broken down the barrier of broodiness?

“Hey, that was at least five words! I’m proud of you, buddy. Also, Cora and Laura? Your parents plan that?”

“No.”

“And we’re back to single words,” Stiles sighed dramatically. Derek frowned, but it was less severe than any of the frowns that had been directed his way earlier. Yay, progress.

“Do you ever think before speaking?”

“Not if I can help it,” Stiles quipped with a sardonic grin. “Too much effort. I’m actually supremely lazy.”

Derek snorted.

“They’re named after our grandmothers. It’s a coincidence that their names rhyme.”

“Well, that’s a shame. But it makes sense, because if your parents were going for rhyming they would have named you something other than Derek. Like… Huh, I can’t think of any boys’ names that end in ‘ora’. Someone should get on that. So where do you fit in the family? I can see you being the protective big brother. You’ve got glaring down to a science, after all. Or are you actually this sullen and grumpy because you’re the family baby, and had a childhood of being bullied into princess dresses by your older sisters?”

Derek actually smiled at that, and God grant him strength, Stiles was about to keel over in shock.

“Both, actually,” Derek said. “Laura is the eldest by four years, and Cora is five years younger than me. So I played big brother and got bullied into dress-up. But it was tutus, not princess dresses. Laura loved ballerinas.”

Stiles laughed brightly, imagining the dour teacher in a tutu, arms crossed and brow furrowed in a scowl.

“And yet, you still talk to her?” Stiles gestured to Derek’s phone. The small grin on Derek’s face fell immediately.

“Yeah, well. She pretty much raised me after our parents died.” Derek admitted quietly. Stiles blinked, lost for words. He hadn’t expected that. Hadn’t expected Derek to say anything at all, actually, let alone willingly tell him something that personal.

“Shit, I’m – ” Stiles fumbled to apologize, heart hammering. Derek shook his head, cutting off Stiles’s condolences. Stiles swallowed heavily and nodded, falling silent. He never knew what to do with loaded statements like that. He understood that Derek didn’t want to hear ‘I’m sorry’, because Stiles never wanted to hear it, either. But ‘I understand’ never felt right, because Stiles didn’t understand, not really. Stiles barely understood the loss of his own mother, and it had taken him over a decade to get to that point.

Grief was unique, and everyone experienced loss differently. Nobody understood how Stiles felt, and Stiles didn’t expect them to. So he wouldn’t presume to understand how Derek felt about losing his parents, either.

Derek cleared his throat uncomfortably, gaze shifting to the door behind them that led back out to the elevators. The space between them had been warming, almost companionable, but the turn of subject had soured it, turning it tense. For once, Stiles actually took the cue, and bobbed his head, unsure of where to look.

“Right. I’m just going to- ” Stiles jerked his thumb towards the door. “Uh, good talk, though.” There was an awkward silence between them, and Stiles felt awful for pushing the conversation too far. He had ruined it, and it had been going so well.

“Right.” He nodded again, and without looking back, scuttled back up to his room to bash his head into a wall and curse himself for always messing everything up.

*

Of course, Stiles couldn’t just abandon Project Frienduce because of a horrible, awkward, no-good ending to their almost conversation. He was in it to win it, and win it he would. So the next morning, Stiles smiled broadly at Derek as soon as he walked into the breakfast room. But instead of bounding over to him and bugging him as Stiles was sure most other guides would, Stiles turned around and walked to the other side of the room.

“Morning, guys!” He greeted one of the seated tables. _Eric, Jonathan, Casey, Brad_ , he checked off silently. Oh yeah, Stiles was the master of remembering names.

“Morning,” they chorused back. Well, mumbled back. These were 13 year old boys, not the von Trapp children.  

“How’d you guys sleep?”

Jonathan shrugged, and Eric began to snicker. Brad just looked flat out guilty, and Casey looked… Well, Casey looked like a little shit, but Stiles was quickly learning that that was exactly what Casey _was_.

“Or,” Stiles’s mouth twitched upward, “Did you not sleep at all?”

“Jonathan brought a case of redbull!” Brad exclaimed suddenly, eyes wide behind wire-rimmed glasses.

“Did he?” Stiles chuckled when the other three at the table turned to shoot Brad betrayed looks. “Ah, come on guys, I’m not going to get you in trouble for that! You wound me, you really do.”

All four of them slumped back into their chairs, clearly relieved.

“So what did you do, if you didn’t sleep all night?” Stiles prompted. Casey turned to him, and Stiles realized a fraction of a second too late how dangerous of a question it was in the hands of the troublemaker.

“What would you say if I told you we had an orgy?” Casey asked, every bit of him radiating challenge. He was clearly expecting Stiles to freak out, get embarrassed, and tell Derek that they were being inappropriate. His friends looked wide-eyed and horrified, like they knew that was exactly what was about to happen.

Stiles laughed, loud and bright. Oh, poor, poor Casey. This was not Stiles’s first rodeo. Stiles had _been_ Casey, once upon a time. He remembered what it was like to want to shock people into paying attention to him. Hell, he still had that old econ paper on the history of male circumcision kicking around somewhere in his apartment. Stiles knew exactly how to handle situations like this, and the answer was not ‘with kid gloves’.

“I’d say, ‘I hope you had enough condoms’,” Stiles replied lightly, giving Casey the sweetest grin he could muster. Beside him, Brad choked on a mouthful of orange juice. Stiles thumped him on the back twice, not breaking eye contact with Casey.

“I’m okay.” Brad offered weakly. Stiles nodded. The boys stared at him, shock fading and quickly becoming replaced by awe.

“Dude.” Eric whispered to Jonathan. Stiles’s grin ripened.

“Well, I’m off to say good morning to the rest of the group.” Stiles gave the boys and exaggerated salute as he moved away from the table, knowing he had won this round against Casey.

Stiles took the next hour to speak to each table separately, joking with the students and answering their questions about that day’s itinerary. By the time he was finished, the last of the tables was polishing off their breakfast, and Stiles had not so much as glanced Derek’s way. On his way out to the lobby, he offered both Erica and Lydia a chipper ‘good morning’, breezing past Derek without extending the same greeting.

Even so, he was genuinely surprised when Derek stopped next to Stiles’s seat at the front of the bus and cleared his throat.

“Hey, man!” Stiles said. “What’s up?”

Derek frowned at him.

“Good morning,” he said angrily. Wait, angrily? How could someone say ‘good’ anything and make it sound angry? Seriously, the man deserved a medal for making a pleasant greeting sound like an insult.  

“Uh… Good morning?” Stiles repeated. “You don’t sound like you mean that. Your words say ‘good morning’, but your voice says ‘I want to kill you and eat your entrails’.”

Derek’s frown deepened, and he brought two fingers up to pinch the bridge of his nose.

“This was a mistake,” he huffed.

“Saying good morning to me was a mistake? Were you aiming for someone else?”

“I was…” Derek huffed again. “Never mind. It was stupid.”

“What was stupid?” Stiles questioned, although he thought he knew the answer. Stiles hadn’t said good morning to Derek, and it had thrown the teacher off kilter. It had made him _want_ Stiles’s morning greeting. Hell yeah, point one for playing hard to get. Stiles barely held in his victory whoop. He wasn’t quite as successful at holding in the fistpump, but caught himself in time to lamely reroute his hand and comb through his hair instead.

Smooth, Stiles. Real smooth.

“Nothing,” Derek growled. “Forget about it.”

And then he stalked to his seat and sat down, turning away from Stiles and glaring out the window.

Stiles let a satisfied smile spread across his face.

Project Frienduce was officially underway.

“Stiles?” Erica leaned over from her seat and waved a hand in front of Stiles’s face.

“Yes?” Stiles asked, still smiling. In fact, his smile might have still been growing wider.  

“Please stop doing that with your face. You’re scaring the children.”

*

Stiles had barely started his walking tour when the class started acting up.

Naturally, it was Casey who set them off by crowing something about the statue’s tits (his words, not Stiles’s).

Chloe had then decided to egg him on by making a comment about _her_ tits (her words, not Stiles’s), which prompted David to sing a song that contained more obscenities than it did verbs.

When the rest of the boys joined in for the chorus, Stiles realized he was facing a full-fledged mutiny and fought back the best way he knew how.

Questioning their masculinity.

“So, guys. I was _going_ to tell you an awesome ghost story, but I’m getting the sense you’re too scared to hear it,” Stiles called out to the group, waiting for a hush to fall over them.

“Ghost stories aren’t scary.” Eddie scoffed from the front.

“Oh, really? Because usually, people only try to distract me with songs about anatomy when they’re too scared to listen to a ghost story.”

“Bullshit!” David shouted. “It’s probably going to be completely lame.”

“Yeah? Well how does this sound? Listen to my story, and if you think it’s lame, not only will I let you sing your song, but I’ll sing it with you.”

“No you won’t.” Julie piped up. “You’d get fired.”

“Nuh-uh,” Stiles replied. Ladies and gentlemen, Stiles Stilinski, paid to bicker with 13 year olds for a living. He brought honour to his family name, he really did. “I wouldn’t get fired, because my company needs me too much. Hell, I’ll sing it _to_ your teachers, if you want. But only if my story is lame. Which I know it isn't, so this conversation is completely unnecessary.”

Stiles had their attention now. They faced him, rapt with attention, waiting for him to start his story. Sure, they were only paying attention because they wanted to prove him wrong, but he’d take what he could get.

Besides, he’d get the last laugh when they all shrieked and screamed like little babies at the end of the story.

Sure enough, he let that last laugh ring out maniacally when Casey jumped a full foot into the air as Stiles finished the story with the most blood-curdling ghost noise he could muster.

Not a single peep of dissent was made for the rest of the walking tour.

Derek clapped him on the shoulder as the kids settled onto the statue garden’s lawn for lunch after the tour. The contact sent a frisson down his spine, and it took great effort for Stiles not to chase after Derek’s hand and whine about the unfairness of this turnaround from hostility. Whether or not Project Frienduce was succeeding, it was helping Stiles become a master of zen, composure and self-restraint.

Practically Yoda, he was.

“You handled the boys well when they started singing. Erica was ready to tape their mouths shut, and I was a second away from intervening.” Derek told him.

Stiles could hardly believe it, but Derek actually _looked_ impressed. Could it be, the formidable Mr. Hale thinking of Stiles as something other than a pain in the ass? Stiles shrugged.

“It’s not a problem. I love handling boys that age,” he replied. Derek gave him an odd look, and –

Oh, Jesus fucking Christ on a raft, what was wrong with his brain-to-mouth filter?

“Not like _that!”_ Stiles backpedalled with a strangled laugh. “I don’t _love_ prepubescent boys, and I didn’t mean handling like _fondling_ , oh my God stop looking at me like I’m a white van away from being on To Catch a Predator!”

Derek was still frowning, his mouth twitching in what _had_ to be a grin.

Well, would you look at that, the man had more settings than ‘disapproving’ and ‘judge-y’ after all.

“You’re really something, you know.” Derek muttered, shaking his head.

“Careful. That was nearly a compliment.”

Derek quirked an eyebrow at him, but offered no comment.

“Well, we can’t let that happen,” Stiles explained with a cheeky grin. “You’d never be able to capitalize on your ability to strike fear in the heart of poor, unsuspecting guides ever again.”

Derek snorted.

“I’d use a lot of words to describe the other guides I’ve met, and ‘unsuspecting’ does not even make the top 100.”

“Semantics.” Stiles waved his hand loftily. “Point is, if you keep up like this, I might actually think you’re a nice person. And that’s taking a gamble, dude, because I could tell my colleagues how nice of a person you are, and then _poof!_ All that angst cred you’ve built up with your permanent glower and scary muscles? Gone. Just like that.”

Derek looked Stiles up and down slowly, and Stiles felt himself redden under the blatant scrutiny. He fidgeted, looking everywhere but at the man in front of him. The second he let his eyes trail back to Derek, he found himself trapped by a piercing gaze.

“I think that’s a gamble I’m willing to take,” Derek murmured, their eyes locked. A crash sounded from nearby, and Stiles jumped back from the crackling tension between them.

“I’m alright!” One of the boys called.

The same could not be said for the garbage can that had been knocked over, sending bits of refuse fluttering all over a priceless statue.

*

By dinnertime, Stiles had totally forgotten about Project Frienduce. He and Derek had spent some of the afternoon’s free time making surprisingly pleasant smalltalk, and Stiles could swear the teacher was actually warming up to him.

Stiles was actually counting the day as a success, and was beginning to think he was preemptive in worrying about his job security.

Until the waiter came out with three lasagnas and a chicken pot pie.

Erica and Lydia turned to him immediately, the former knowingly and the latter appraisingly. The waiter slid their respective plates onto the table and disappeared around the corner.

Derek stared at his pot pie like it was poison.

“What’s this?” He asked. No, not asked. It wasn’t a question, it was a loaded accusation.

“Um, chicken pot pie?” Stiles responded, unable to stop the flush rising to his cheeks. He was already regretting his decision to switch out Derek’s meal, especially in light of Erica stifling a giggle behind her hand next to him.

“The others have lasagna.” Derek stated.

There were at least fifty excuses on the tip of Stiles’s tongue (the kitchen ran out, I thought you were lactose intolerant, mix-up at head office, the waiter spilled your lasagna), but he bit them back and instead just offered a nod.

“That they do.”

His heart was hammering against his ribcage, and he was just waiting for one of the other teachers to call him out on his obvious (not to mention borderline creepy) favoritism. But Derek just grunted, frowned at his plate, and shoveled a bite into his mouth. Every muscle in Stiles’s body relaxed.

“Suck-up.” Erica muttered into his ear.

“I prefer ‘accommodating’,” Stiles whispered back.

“I bet you are. I bet you’d accommodate him all night long.”

“That doesn’t make any sense.” Stiles hissed, flicking a glance to make sure Derek didn’t hear.

“Hey, Derek?” Erica said louder, following Stiles’s gaze. Derek looked up from his plate.

“What?”

“The lasagna is super tasty.”

“I don’t like lasagna.” Derek replied. “You know that.”

“You’re right, I do know that.” Erica grinned. “Isn’t it lucky that you wound up with chicken pot pie?”

Derek frowned at her. Understandably, because she was acting like a lunatic. Stiles should know, he practically made a career out of acting like a lunatic.

“I guess.”

“I should go check on the students!” Stiles announced loudly, dropping his fork with a clatter and standing up. All three teachers swiveled their heads to stare at him, and he exhaled in relief when the focus shifted away from Derek and the stupid pot pie.

Stiles busied himself with his group for the rest of the meal, preventing at least three major spills and stopping an attempt to eat a full tablespoon of salt on a dare.

He only took a break to head to the bathroom when dessert came out, and the students were so absorbed in their ice cream he knew none of them would bother getting into trouble. He passed Derek on his way there.

“Hey,” Derek said casually, pushing off of the wall like he had been waiting for Stiles.

Wait, had he been waiting for Stiles?

“Hey,” Stiles parroted, voice a bit faint.

“Erica said she mentioned that I hate Italian food.”

“Yeah?” Stiles refused to look bashful. He didn’t do bashful. He did suave, smooth, and in control.

Well, not really. He did spastic and flailing, but the point remained that he did not do bashful.

“Thanks for doing that for me. I like chicken pot pie.”

“I know.” Stiles blurted.

Derek cocked an eyebrow.

“I mean- Erica mentioned it? That you liked chicken pot pie. And it’s not really a big deal, I mean, I had to call the restaurant to confirm our group size anyway, so I figured if you hate lasagna why would I make them serve you lasagna? I know the owner, since I’m here pretty much every tour, and he normally doesn’t mind me making substitutions, so…” Stiles trailed off, noticing the bemused look on Derek’s face.

“So, yeah. Nothing to thank me for.” Stiles concluded. He was sure he was bright red. Derek made a frustrated noise.

“Can’t you just take the thanks?” Derek sounded pained, which baffled Stiles. Stiles hadn’t _asked_ Derek to accost him by the bathroom.

Really, what was _up_ with this guy?

And why did it make Stiles want to chain him to a bed and figure it out, instead of just letting it go?

Oh, boy.

There was an image Stiles never wanted to let go of.

“No thanks to take, dude! Really!” Stiles insisted.

“Is it so hard to say you’re welcome?” Derek ground out.

“Uh, it is when there’s nothing to thank me for?” Stiles spoke slowly, like Derek was having trouble grasping the concept. Sure, it might have been patronizing, but Derek was acting _weird_. He totally deserved it. Derek didn’t seem to agree, if the growl he let out was any indication, pitching forward into Stiles’s personal space.

Woah, hello there.

Oh, no.

That hello was not meant for Stiles’s pants. Calm down, boy.

“You say that, but do you know what?” Derek took another step towards Stiles, practically crowding him against the wall.

Oh God, oh God, oh God, Derek was so very close. How were Derek’s eyes _legal_?

“Uh, what?” Stiles squeaked.

“You’re the first guide who’s done it.”

“Oh.” For the sake of his pride and dignity, Stiles was going to pretend it came out as a manly expletive, and not a breathy sigh.

“Stiles?”

Was it his imagination, or was Derek’s voice pitched lower than normal? Stiles hoped it was his imagination because he did _not_ have the mental faculties to process the alternative.

“Hm?”

Stiles stared everywhere but at the face dangerously close to his. Oh, look, there was a crack in the ceiling, what a lovely ceiling-crack it was. Thank God for ceiling cracks.

“Say, you’re welcome.”

“Mmph?” Stiles tried to say words, he really did, but Derek was so close and it was not doing good things to Stiles’s brain.

“Right now, Erica and Lydia are both watching us. I can’t go back to the dining room until Erica’s seen me thank you for being nice. She and Lydia chewed me out for being ungrateful. So I’m being grateful. Say you’re welcome, Stiles.”

“Nngh.” Stiles informed him intelligently.  

Derek snorted.

“Good boy.”

Well, that was unfair. Stiles did not mean ‘you’re welcome’, he meant ‘stop using your superhuman physique to bully people into social niceties’! Stiles opened his mouth to protest, but Derek had already stepped back, and Stiles’s focus shifted on stopping the embarrassing noise that bubbled up at the sudden loss of Derek near his person.

“Hey!” Stiles managed to get out, throwing an arm out to catch Derek before he left. But it was too late, and Stiles could only watch as Derek strode back into the dining room. As soon as he was out of sight, Stiles flailed wildly to stop himself from sliding down the wall into a crumpled heap of sexual frustration and goo.

Holyshitwhathadjusthappened.

Was that flirting?

Was Derek _flirting_ with him?

_What had the chef put in that chicken pot pie?_

Stiles scrabbled his way along the wall until he was in the safety of the bathroom, mind spinning and heart thumping out of control.

*

The third day was Museum Day, aptly named for the fact that the class had to hit three museums between 8 and 6. Art, lunch, natural history, and then finishing off with science and technology before dinner.

By the time they were in the rotunda of the natural history museum, Stiles was ready to surrender himself to the museum taxidermist to avoid leading the rest of the tour. He wondered if he’d fit in with the Neanderthal models in the hall of human origins. He could play the role of ‘scrawny _Homo sapiens_ who wandered too far away from home’. Being killed, stuffed, and mounted definitely seemed like the better option than his present job, which had just required that he report a girl to Erica for getting handsy with her boyfriend on the bus.

Luckily for Stiles’s sanity, the natural history museum was unguided, and the students were let loose for two hours to roam the halls unsupervised. Which meant Stiles, too, got a couple hours of unsupervised time.

Not a minute too soon.

Stiles wandered the museum halls aimlessly, until he found himself facing Derek in front of one of the North America dioramas. A wolf was rearing up on its hind legs, denmates crouched just feet away.

“Oh. Hey.” Derek turned to greet Stiles, then turned back to the scene in front of him. He seemed entranced by the still animals.

“Most people spend their time in the hall of African mammals. More exciting stuff there, like elephants.” Stiles remarked. Derek shrugged, still not turning to face Stiles.

“Not really my thing.”

“More into these guys?” Stiles asked.  

“ _Canis lupus nubilis._ The Great Plains wolf.Subspecies of the gray wolf.” Derek informed him.

“Huh.”

“Most common subspecies of gray wolf in North America. Mostly sticks to Canada, but ranges down into some of the Eastern states, too.”

“You know a lot about wolves?” Stiles asked, curious. Derek nodded.

“I studied them, at school.”

“Really?” Stiles wrinkled his nose. He imagined Derek studying something like kinesiology, or physical education.

“Let me guess, you thought I was a gym teacher.” Derek leveled Stiles with a flat look. Who knew it was possible to shove that much disdain into a single facial expression?

“Guilty as charged,” Stiles admitted. “Totally uncool of me, though. That’s what I get for judging a book by its very muscly cover. So, science?”

“Mmm. Science.”

“Wolfy science.” Stiles prodded, hoping to get more out of Derek. His efforts were rewarded with an eyeroll.

“Wolf conservation.” Derek corrected. “My master’s thesis was on how proximity to wolves impacted human attitudes towards conservation programs.”

That was actually… Seriously cool. And hot. As was the idea of Derek in khakis and hiking boots, tracking wolves in the middle of a national park.

Stiles’s brain was an odd place, indeed.

“Let me guess; the further away, the less people cared about conservation?” Stiles inquired, giving the park ranger Derek in his head a shirt unbuttoned way lower than was practical for a field biologist.

“The opposite, actually.” Derek was still staring straight ahead, eyes roving over the leaping wolf. Stiles used his distraction as a chance to stare at Derek unabashedly, taking in every detail from his stubble-shadowed jaw to his pale hands, half covered by the arms of his leather jacket.

“How’s that work?”

“People who live far away from wolves never have to deal with them. As long as they’re made aware of conservation issues, it’s easy to get their support. People, especially young people, respond empathetically to cuddly animals doing cuddly things. You play up the social nature of wolves, the majesty of the great American wilderness, and that’s that taken care of. But closer to wolf territories, people have wolf control problems. Attacking farm animals, sometimes people, scaring off campers… Takes more than a baby wolf pictures to get them to want to protect what they perceive as a danger to their safety.”

“Makes sense.”

“Hmm.” Derek doesn’t sound convinced. “Anyway, my thesis focused on education in wolf-adjacent areas. How we can teach people, especially kids, to respect wolves and protect them even though they’re given a bad rep at home.”

“Did you find a brilliant solution?” Stiles inquired, genuinely curious. Derek shot him a placating smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes.

“Nah. But I realized I was pretty good at the teaching part.”

“Yeah,” Stiles agreed, following Derek’s gaze to the wolf, who stared back with glass eyes. “Yeah, you kind of are.”

*

The fourth night of the tour was the dinner dance, hands down Stiles’s least favourite part of his job. They crammed all of the groups in the city that week into a banquet hall with no air conditioning and a DJ equipped with top 40 hits, and it almost always ended in disaster. 

In his time as a guide, Stiles had learned very quickly that 13 year olds away from home and sexually-charged music were two things that should never mix. During training, his company explicitly told new guides that their job at the dance was to patrol the dance floor and push in between pairs of dancers getting too cozy. Stiles spent the entirety of every dance questioning whether his role as cockblock to barely teenaged youth made him a good person or a lame one.

He had come to terms with the fact that he was both, but that didn’t mean he had to be happy about spending an evening pulling kids out of corners and shooing them out of the banquet hall basement, with its skeezy lighting and sketchy couch. Stiles didn’t even _want_ to think about what happened on that couch during some of the banquet hall’s other events.

It was during one of his routine passes through said basement that he found one of the girls from his group sitting alone on the couch, looking forlorn. He frowned as he approached her. Anika was a nice girl, if a bit quiet, and had hardly struck Stiles as the basement lurking type. Had someone left her there?

“Hey Anika,” Stiles gave her a little wave. “You feeling alright?”

Anika nodded, but as soon as she looked up at Stiles her whole face crumpled and she looked like she was about to cry. Stiles knew that face. That was the face of heartbreak.

“That’s not an alright face,” Stiles remarked. “Wanna talk about it?” Anika shrugged, staring glumly past Stiles. Stiles sat down on the arm of the sofa, waiting for Anika to break the ice.

“Ella was dancing with Henry,” the girl said finally, in a quiet voice. Stiles nodded. Ella was Anika’s best friend. If she was dancing with the boy Anika had a crush on, he could see why Anika would retreat to the basement.

“Does Ella know you like Henry?” Stiles asked. Anika burst into tears.

“I don’t like Henry!” She blubbered into her hands.

Oh.

_Oh._

Well, that was a different ballgame.

“Does Ella know how you feel about _her_?” Stiles asked, voice considerably softer. Anika peered up at him through her fingers, looking absolutely gutted. She shook her head slowly.

“She wouldn’t be my friend if she knew.” Anika whispered, her face a textbook definition of misery.

“I think she would,” Stiles replied. Anika didn’t respond.

“Can I tell you a story?” Stiles asked. Anika shrugged.

“Well, when I was a little older than you, I started noticing people around me a little differently. I had a huge crush on a boy on my lacrosse team, and it made me really, really scared. Because I was terrified of what people would think of me if they found out. D’you know who I was most afraid would find out, though?”

Anika blinked at him with huge eyes, and Stiles could practically see her processing what he had just told her.

“The boy?” She guessed, her voice barely above a whisper. Stiles smiled and shook his head.

“Nope. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I thought it’d be pretty embarrasing if the boy found out. But I was most afraid that my best friend Scott would find out. I thought the same thing you did. If Scott knew that I liked boys, he wouldn’t want to be my friend anymore. I was convinced, in my head, that he’d think that I had a crush on _him_ , and he’d be so weirded out that he’d never want to see me, or hang out with me.”

“Did you ever tell him?” Anika asked. Stiles’s smile grew.

“Yup. And d’you know what happened?”

“What?”

“He gave me the biggest hug in the world, and he told me I was an idiot for not telling him sooner. And that he was my best friend, and he loved me no matter what.”

“Really? You’re not just telling me that to make me feel better?”

“So suspicious!” Stiles _tsk_ -ed. “I’m definitely telling you the truth. We could go ask him, if you don’t believe me.”

“Ask him?”

“Did you see the guide here with Franklin Junior High? With the floppy hair and crooked jaw?”

“The one you hugged when we got here?” She asked curiously.

“Mmhmm. That’s my buddy Scott.” Stiles beamed at her.

“Oh.” Anika bit her lip, thinking, for a solid minute. “I’ve never… Talked to anyone about this before. Anyone that… Understood.”

“I understand, Anika. I really do.”

Anika shot him a little smile, and Stiles was glad to see it, however watery it was.

“What about the boy you had a crush on?” She asked after another second of silence, clearly still thinking about Ella.

“I saw him kissing his girlfriend by the lockers one day after school.” Stiles answered with a shrug.

“So he didn’t like you back.” Anika sounded betrayed by the information. Stiles knew she was hoping for a happy ending.

“No, he didn’t. But trust me when I say, I know how it feels to watch Ella dance with someone else.”

“It sucks.”

Stiles chuckled.

“It really, really does.”

“I think I’m ready to go back upstairs now.” Anika said as she stood up from the sofa. Stiles followed as she headed towards the stairs.

“Stiles?” She asked as they walked side by side back towards the hall.

“Hm?”

“Did you get over him?”

Stiles laughed.

“I did,” he replied, then poked her side playfully. “In fact, then I fell for someone funnier, cuter, and way cooler. And do you know what?”

Anika shook her head.

“That time, he liked me back.”

By the time they got to Anika’s table, she was smiling again, all traces of tears gone from her face.  

*

The night security guard was late. Stiles had expected him to be there after they got home from the dance, but here Stiles was, almost an hour later, still waiting. He drummed his fingers against the end table beside him, lost in his thoughts.

“What did you say to Anika?” Derek’s voice startled Stiles out of his reverie. He jumped back, limbs flailing and hand flying to clutch at his heart.

“Jeez, dude, make some noise next time.”

“Did you say something to Anika?” Derek repeated.

“Huh?” Stiles’s brow furrowed. “Oh, yeah. She was a little down about Ella dancing with someone, so we had a little chat about love.” As he said it, Stiles realized how that could be misconstrued. His eyes grew wide and his heart plummeted.

“Oh, shit. Did I cross a line? Shit, dude, I didn’t – I was just trying to help, okay? I’m really sorry, shit, it didn’t even occur to me…” Stiles trailed off as he realized that Derek was shaking his head, eyebrows furrowed pensively.

“No, you didn’t cross a line, don’t worry about it.” Derek sounded thoughtful, his eyes appraising Stiles carefully.

“Anika’s been having a really rough time lately. She made it sound like you understood what it was like to be that age and…” Derek trailed off, huffing out an exasperated breath. “Whatever you said seemed to resonate with her. She needed it, so thank you.”

Stiles nodded, a little shell-shocked. Derek stared at him for another second, like he was going to say something else, but instead he just turned around to head out of the lobby.

His hand paused on the door handle, though, and then he was looking back at Stiles, his gaze open, warm.

“It’s hard for me to connect with them, sometimes,” Derek admitted quietly, hand still poised on the door like he was a second from bolting. Stiles heart sunk at the implication of Derek’s confession. Irrationally, since he had assumed Derek was straight anyhow. Stiles was about to nod and say something sarcastic, but Derek took a deep breath and kept talking before he could.   

“I didn’t mean… I meant, I understand what…” Derek looked very much like the words he was trying to get out were physically paining him. “I remember it too. It just seems so long ago, and- I just... I have to be careful what I say, because I work hard to keep my personal life away from my role as a teacher. I’ve heard of parents overreacting for less.”

Wait, what?

Stiles could have sworn he heard a _bzzt_ in the back of his head as his brain actually fried the fuck out, completely shutting down.

He understood –

Derek Hale remembered –

Was –

Oh, no, brain train. Stiles was not taking the bait.

Oops.

Stiles was totally taking the bait.

“That sucks, dude.” Stiles was sure his eye was twitching with the effort it took to not say something inappropriate. “Especially since I know kids like Anika would really appreciate having someone like you as a role model.”

Derek waved him off.

“Not really. They just think I’m their old, stuffy teacher. They don’t want to picture me as a human being, because then they would feel bad about hating me for giving them extra math homework.”

Stiles laughed, and Derek quirked a grin. Stiles loved his tiny almost-smiles, when Derek’s eyes crinkled at the corners and his cheeks dimpled just the tiniest bit. Stiles wasn’t obsessed with Derek or anything, but if he were, he would definitely start keeping a tally of the smiles that Derek gave him.

Thank God he didn’t have a pen and paper on him, because now he really wanted a tally of the smiles Derek gave him.

“Old and stuffy? As if, dude! You’re like, the hottest teacher on the planet. Be honest, how many times do you find notes with your name doodled in hearts around your classroom?” Stiles joked. Derek’s grin fell.

“Often enough that I know I can’t open up to the kids about things like my love life. It’s inviting trouble. I’m their teacher, not their friend.” Derek spoke firmly, ending the discussion between them. Stiles bit his lip. There he went again, pushing too far, and ruining any semblance of camaraderie between them. He felt gutted, and was about to make his excuses to get the hell out of dodge, when something about Derek’s expression softened.

“I’m glad that people like you can take up the mantle,” Derek added. “Not many guides are so honest with the kids. It was… Nice of you. You’re good at this.”

“Just doing my job.” Stiles knew he was blushing horribly at the praise. There was a beat of silence between them, but it was surprisingly comfortable.

“After the guard gets here, are you off duty for the night?” Derek asked, leaning his hip against the table that Stiles was drumming his fingers along.

“Uh, yeah. Normally. If you want me to stick around and help you patrol for a bit I guess I could, though. Why, was there a problem with the guard last night? If there was a problem, I have to report it to my boss. Sometimes the guys the security company sends are a bit quacky, you know, power-tripping mall cop types or just assholes who don’t really give a shit about the students. Once we caught a night guard taking twenty dollar bribes from the kids to get out of their room. I didn’t know who to be more appalled at, the kids or the guard. Because seriously? Twenty bucks? That’s kind of steep to go eat party-sized bags of Cheetos in your bro’s room. So, yeah, if the guard has been a problem, let me know, even though tonight is the last night of the trip.”

Derek looked kind of dizzy, and Stiles realized he might have accidentally gone off a bit too tangentially instead of answering the simple question.

“No, the guide was fine,” Derek assured him. “I was, uh. I know you normally go swimming after the kids go to sleep?”

Stiles was torn between being thrilled because Derek knew that about him, and being flustered because Derek knew that about him.

“Uh, yeah. Good way to burn off excess energy and pent up rage I can’t take out on Casey. Oh, oops. I probably shouldn’t say things like that in front of you.”

Derek let out a bark of laughter.

“Don’t worry, we all have coping mechanisms to handle Casey.”

“Right. Well, mine is swimming. So I will probably be doing that. After the guard gets here, I mean.”

“There’s a bar not too far from the hotel.” Derek said suddenly. Stiles frowned. Derek was really serious about those non-sequitors, wasn’t he? Stiles waited for Derek to continue, but the man said nothing else, just stared at Stiles like he was trying to bore a hole into his skull with his eyes.

“Yeah?” Stiles offered tentatively, because the impasse they had reached was really, really weird.

“Would you- I mean, if it’s not against your company policy. As a thank you? You’re doing a great job on this tour.”

Stiles was clearly sleep deprived, because that sounded a lot like it was a bumbling invitation for a drink.

Which it couldn’t be, because Derek Hale would not invite Stiles for a late night drink at a dive bar next to a hotel.

Would he?

Holy shit, Derek Hale had just invited him out for a drink. Seriously, Stiles should get paid extra for the trauma that this trip was inflicting on his poor brain.

“Hold up,” Stiles held his hands up, needing to clarify what was happening before he jumped to conclusions so far off base that he’d be committed if he voiced them aloud. “Did you just invite me out for a drink?”

Derek nodded tightly, looking supremely uncomfortable.

“Like, socially? Like, a drink to talk about ourselves and get to know each other and so help me God you just told me you were gay, didn’t you? You just told me you were gay and now you’re inviting me out for a drink. Jesus fuck, I think you’ve broken my brain, Derek. I may be having an episode right now. Because you just invited me out for a drink, and maybe you meant that platonically and oh shit, you probably meant it platonically, didn’t you? And now I’ve made a huge idiot of myself and this definitely counts as sexual harassment. Is this how the other guides got into trouble? Oh, I’m such an asshole, you were just being friendly and I’ve made it weird, I’m so sorry. Agh, you should totally report me, I didn’t think I would need to be reported but now I’ve gone and done it, I definitely deserve it.” Stiles sucked in a huge breath of air. He was literally seconds away from falling over. Maybe he should do just that, actually.

If he played dead, maybe he could get pardoned from the rest of the tour and _never have to see Derek again_.

That sounded like a plan Stiles could get behind.

“I’m sorry,” Derek said, looking horrified. Horrified because of the fact that Stiles had a major, crushing, incapacitating hard-on for Derek’s stupid face. “I really shouldn’t have done that. I’ve never done that before. I’ll – I’m on my way to bed. Sorry.”

“Wait, what?” Stiles literally _jumped_ off of the chair to catch Derek before he had time to run out of the room like he always seemed to do. “What the fuck are you apologizing for?”

“You – I – I should know better than anyone how awkward it is to be put in this sort of place on these tours. I’m very sorry to have made you uncomfortable. I’ll keep my distance for the rest of the tour.”

Stiles recoiled like he had been slapped in the face.

“Hold up; put in my place? Like, been hit on? Like, you were hitting on me? Holy shitballs, you’re interested in me. You’re _interested in me_?”

Derek squeezed his eyes shut, nostrils flaring as he exhaled hard.

“I’m sorry that I made you uncomfortable.”

“Sorry that you made me uncomfortable?” Stiles shrieked. “ _I have practically been writing sonnets about you since you stepped onto my bus!_ ”

“What?”

“I am not uncomfortable, you lunatic! This is not me freaking out because your advances are unwanted, have you seen yourself? This is me freaking the fuck out because I am having difficulty grasping the concept that my ridiculous crush on you is reciprocated! I did not think it was conceivably possible that you would return my very blatant interest, you giant moron!”

A charged silence fell between them, Derek’s eyebrows cycling through at least a dozen expressions before settling on ‘amused’.

Which was better than ‘horrified’, at least.

“Oh,” he finally said.

Stiles couldn’t hold it in any longer. He laughed uncontrollably, until his stomach cramped and his eyes were watering. When he finally calmed down, Derek was laughing with him, both of them doubled over in the hotel lobby.

“Oh is right.” Stiles shook his head and wiped his eyes, still grinning ear to ear. “Seriously, this is way out of left field, dude.”

“I thought I had made it obvious. I said good morning to you.”

“Um, that’s called common courtesy? Erica said good morning to me, does she want a piece of the Stiles?”

Derek wrinkled his nose. Just when Stiles thought he was starting to figure Derek out, he went and wrinkled his nose like some oversized woodland creature. Stiles was man enough to admit that his heart fluttered and his insides turned to goo a little, because it was legitimately the cutest thing he had ever seen in his life.

And Stiles used to volunteer at a ferret rescue center.

He was no stranger to cute.

“Erica is married. And please never refer to yourself as ‘the Stiles’. It sounds like something Casey would do.”

“Oh, nice, make me think of your 13 year old student when I’m trying to get my game on. Way to send mixed messages.”

Derek shrugged, but his lips twitched into a grin.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to,” he replied, leaning towards Stiles. “I think we’ve already had enough mixed messages for tonight, don’t you?”

*

Only after they had sat at the bar, Derek nursing a beer and Stiles sipping on something ridiculously red with a blue umbrella and maraschino cherry, did it occur to Stiles that their outing was, technically, against the rules.

But Derek didn’t need to know that.

“So, fraternizing with teachers is totally against the rules.” Stiles blurted out.

Welp, apparently he was going to find out anyway. Really, hadn’t Stiles learned his lesson about the brain-to-mouth filter already? Sometimes he wondered how he had managed 22 years of existence the way he was.

“You gonna report me?” Stiles continued, because apparently his brain wasn’t done digging himself a grave just quite yet. Lovely. Well, carry on, brain, might as well finish the job. Stiles would never get in the way of his brain ruining his chances with Derek Hale.

Sure enough, Derek had stiffened beside him.

“Of course I’m not going to report you. I invited you, remember?”

“Yeah, but your history isn’t exactly full of positive guide-teacher relationships.” As he said it, Stiles let his head thunk against the bar counter. It was times like this that Stiles wished he had a white flag to wave at his own thoughts.

“Touché.” Derek murmured.

“I know – Wait, what? You’re not pissy that I brought it up?”

Derek shrugged.

“Why be pissy? It’s true. I can’t imagine the kind of shit they say about me at your office. Be honest with me, how often do guides get written up for sexual harassment?”

“Once a year at least. Sometimes twice, but rarely.”

“The ‘at least’ is my group, isn’t it?”

Stiles nodded miserably. Well, this was going horribly. Stiles should have known better than to think that he could have nice things.

“Believe it or not, I did not start chaperoning these damn things with the intention of becoming gossip around your water-cooler.” Derek sounded so put out that Stiles couldn’t help but flash him a wry grin.

“No, I imagine you started chaperoning because the only other male teacher at your school retired and someone bullied you into it.”

“That’s… Surprisingly accurate.”

Stiles tilted his glass to Derek.

“I’m a natural Sherlock, wouldn’t you know.”

Derek rolled his eyes at Stiles, but clinked their glasses nonetheless.

“Point remains, I didn’t ask for your colleagues to hit on me. And it wasn’t just hitting on me, as you probably know. Each person I reported acted completely inappropriately in front of my class. Jeopardizing not only their integrity, but my own. I reported them because I genuinely felt that your company should be aware of their behavior.”

Stiles made a noise at the back of his throat, torn between indignity on behalf of his fellow guides and incredulity at the suggestion that Stiles was any better. 

“How is this any different? Here I am, expressing my interest in you. Just like they did. And don’t tell me it’s different because the feelings are reciprocated, because that’s bullshit. You reported Danny, Derek. _Danny!_ Have you seen those dimples? Of course you have, he must have dimpled you harder than he’s dimpled anyone in his life. You reported Danny and his supernatural fucking dimples, and you’re sitting here telling me this is somehow different?”

“Yes,” Derek said plainly, like it was some be-all-end-all-explanation.

Which it totally wasn’t, so Stiles just set his mouth in a thin line and sat back on the barstool, waiting for Derek to elaborate.

“It’s different because you waited until _I_ made the first move. You never made me feel uncomfortable, you never pushed the issue in front of my class, and even now when we’re somewhere _nobody_ could see us, you’re still thinking about your job first!”

Stiles must have still looked skeptical, because Derek leaned forward and continued with a passionate glint in his eye.

“Look. The reason I report guides is because they shift the focus away from the kids. They’re so wrapped up in themselves, in trying to get _me_ to notice _them_ , that they forget what they’re here to do. This is the first time a lot of these kids have been away from home. It should be a positive experience, and it should be about them. You - I wanted to write you off, because you weren’t exactly subtle about the way you looked at me, and I figured it’d be the same old story. Besides, you were a mouthy little shit to me, and Christ, you infuriated me. You were so fucking infuriating, and I couldn’t stop wantingto be around you, and it made me hate you even more. To make it worse, instead of being a self-absorbed idiot, you actually care about my students. Everything on this tour is secondary to the kids. I could be dancing naked on the table, and your first thought would probably be to make sure I didn’t knock the parmesan cheese over near Shelly because she’s allergic.”

“Uh, I don’t know. I mean, dancing is one thing, but _naked_?”

“You know what I mean.”

“Yeah, and I don’t know what else to say to that. You just told me you hated me, dude. Not cool.”

Derek made an aggravated noise, a cross between a growl and a snarl.

“I _didn’t_ say that. I said I hated how much I fucking liked you, you idiot. I hate how you are making it impossible for me _not_ to want you!”

Stiles blinked.

Blinked again.

Oh.

That actually made sense.

Stiles tilted his head, briefly considering how bizarre his relationship with himself was that ‘you’re so infuriating that I want to fuck your brains out’ seemed like a perfectly logical explanation for someone’s interest in him.

But hey, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, right?

Hold on, no, that one didn’t make sense. Gift horses, that was the one he was looking for. Stiles was a fan of not looking them in the mouth. Ha, was there an adage about not looking a gift date in the psyche?

“I can live with that,” Stiles decided. “Okay, consider me convinced.”

Derek chuckled.

“Has anyone ever told you how odd you are?”

“Repeatedly, and enthusiastically,” Stiles confirmed, nodding vigorously.

“You’re really well suited to this job, then.”

“You have no idea. Honestly, I can’t imagine doing anything else.”

“I didn’t get the sense that tour guiding had many lifers.” Derek remarked with a raised eyebrow.

“Just because I can’t imagine doing anything else doesn’t mean I never will. This is a gap year thing, actually. Going to grad school next year, after I’ve got a bit of a nest egg built up.”

Derek looked genuinely surprised at the information, like he couldn’t picture Stiles doing research or taking life seriously. Which, fuck that, because Stiles was pretty awesome at school.

“I graduated at the top of my class. Double major in folklore and anthropology.” Stiles tried not to sound too defensive when he spoke. If Derek picked up on it, he didn’t let it show as he nodded in understanding.

“What are you hoping to work on?” He asked, instead of commenting on Stiles’s academic prowess. Stiles flashed him a grin. He had nearly mentioned it to Derek at the museum days earlier, but hadn’t wanted to interrupt a chance to get to know Derek underneath his prickly exterior.

“Werewolves.” Stiles replied innocently. Derek choked on his drink.

“No, but seriously,” he said when he had finished coughing.

“I am serious!” Stiles insisted. “Werewolves are becoming much more popular in mainstream Western media, you know? I want to look at werewolves in popular culture, compare our manifestations of werewolves against classical portrayals, and maybe try to look at why we’re so drawn to the concept.”

“Why’d you let me go on about my wolves if you study them, too?” Derek asked with a small pout.

Actually.

A pout.

Derek Hale was _pouting_ at Stiles because Stiles hadn’t stopped his impassioned ‘save-the-wolves’ routine at the museum. Stiles laughed.

“It was fun, hearing your perspective. And I don’t know much about wolves. I know about werewolves. And people. My wolf-y knowledge pales in comparison to yours. Like, subspecies? What’s a subspecies? I know _Canis lupus_ , and the rest is jargon to me. It’s cool, though. I’d love to learn more about actual wolves. Oh man, would you teach me? You should totally teach me. I think we’d make an awesome team. Once I start school again, I mean. In fact, you gave me a great idea already when you were talking about attitudes and education.”

“Yeah?” Derek perked up.

“Yeah. It’d be really cool to look into how the popularity of werewolves and people’s interest in werewolves impacts their perspective of real wolves, wouldn’t it?”

Derek looked impressed by Stiles’s suggestion. Well, duh, it was impressive. He also looked really interested, which, again, duh. If Stiles was being honest, he had already done a lit search on the subject, and had a new word document on his computer with a list of preliminary sources to start with.

But Derek didn’t need to know that.

Yet.

*

Stiles had planned to go back to his room after his fourth drink. He really had. He was a good boy, a rule-abider, a professional.

He was guide of the month. Every month. He didn’t do things like hook up while on tour. Especially not with teachers.

Stiles was not the sort of guide to hook up with teachers on tour.

“So, you’re on the fifth floor?” Derek asked, finger hovering over the button in the elevator.

“Sending me off already?” Stiles drawled. Well, that came out wrong. Stiles had _meant_ to say ‘yes, I am on the fifth floor, where I will be getting off of this elevator alone. It was a pleasure having a professional not-at-all-sexually-charged drink with you tonight’.

“You have got a group of rowdy teenagers to handle bright and early tomorrow morning. I figured you'd want a good night's rest.”

“They’re not sleeping, why should I?” Stiles murmured, crowding into Derek’s space.

Derek’s eyes flit down to Stiles mouth, then back up to meet his gaze. Stiles unconsciously whetted his lower lip.

Then the elevator opened and it was like a bucket of icewater being dumped over his head.

What was he _doing_?

“This is my floor.” Derek rasped, voice scratchy and eyes still locked with Stiles’s.

“Yeah?” Stiles breathed. He knew he was supposed to push Derek out of the elevator and keep his distance, but sweet Jesus that voice made Stiles want to do a lot of things, and ‘leave’ was not one of them. He was clinging to rationality, until every last bit of judgment he possessed flew out the window when Derek put his hand on Stiles’s wrist.

“Wanna come in for a bit?”

“I wanna stay the night,” Stiles mumbled.

“Yeah.” Derek agreed with a nod. “Yeah, stay.”

Stiles wondered vaguely where the night guard was, since he didn’t see him in the hallway as they stumbled to Derek’s door, shushing each other in case any of the kids were still awake.

As soon as the door clicked shut behind them, Stiles didn’t care whether the guard had left the goddamned building, because Derek was _kissing_ him, and motherfucking monkeys in a barrel, Stiles had never been kissed like that before.

It was less kissing and more devouring, and Stiles gave back with equal fervor, letting himself be pushed towards the neatly made bed in the middle of the room. Stiles was quick to reach along the hem of Derek’s shirt, pushing under the fabric and brushing the pads of his fingers along well-defined abs.

“Off, off, off,” He mumbled, scrabbling at the fabric until Derek took pity on him and shrugged his shirt off. Stiles’s plaid button-up followed, tossed to a corner of the room before Derek wound his arms tight around Stiles’s waist and pulled him in until their chests were pressed together

Stiles’s heart stuttered at the feeling of skin on skin, his head falling back and his breath escaping in a single exhale. Derek mouthed down Stiles’s jaw, biting kisses down his throat. If he hadn’t already been hard, Derek trailing his tongue from Stiles’s collarbone to his ear would have done it in a second. Stiles keened, hips bucking forward against Derek.

“Puh- please,” Stiles stammered out, hands flitting from Derek’s hair to his shoulders to his hips, unable to keep still, wanting to touch him everywhere.

“Please what?” The words were warmed by Derek’s breath, right next to his ear, filthy and promising. Derek’s hands slipped down to grab Stiles’s ass and yank him in even closer, grinding them together.

“That. That. More of that, please,” Stiles pushed against Derek’s hands, trying his best to encourage the thumbs that were playing along the waistband of his jeans, brushing down to skim the swell of his ass.

Derek must have gotten the message, because he dropped to his knees, fingers flying forward to yank open Stiles’s fly and pull out his straining erection.

Then he looked up at Stiles, clear eyes lust-blown and hooded by dark lashes, and Stiles couldn’t help but touch. He trailed his finger along Derek’s eyebrow, curving over a high cheekbone and pressing gently against Derek’s bottom lip, which dropped open as the man let out a gentle breath.

“Hey,” Stiles murmured. “You gonna suck me?”

Derek didn’t say anything, only nodded, and leaned forward to take the head of Stiles’s cock into his mouth without closing his eyes. Stiles groaned appreciatively, one hand tangling loosely in Derek’s hair while the other curled tightly at his side until his nails bit into his palm painfully.

“Fuck,” he breathed out as Derek took him deeper. “Fuck, you’re good at that. I don’t wanna… Careful, I want you to… I don’t wanna…”

Derek pulled off his cock with an obscenely wet noise, lips shiny with spit and precum.

“Use your words, Stiles,” he intoned, twisting his debauched lips into a wry smile.

“I want to come with you inside me,” Stiles finally got out, all in one breath, and then Derek was on top of him again, and they were both on the bed, and Derek was yanking his pants off and mouthing at Stiles’s neck like he meant it.

“Careful, don’t – hickey,” Stiles panted, twisting his jeans off of his ankles and rolling on top of Derek so that their cocks were trapped between them, heat pooling low in his belly as Derek bucked his hips up against Stiles.

“Christ, when this trip is done,” Derek rasped, hands clamping down on Stiles’s hips as he moved, the catch and slide of their bodies nearly sending Stiles over the edge.

“What?” Stiles leaned down to nip at Derek’s jaw. “What’re you going to do when the trip is over?”

“Gonna take you out,” Derek told him, never stilling, pushing them both closer to the edge. “Gonna take you home with me, do it proper, cover you in bruises, fuck you into my mattress.”

Stiles hated to play the role of harlequin heroine, but the loud noise that escaped him could not be described with any word other than wanton.

“Fuck, Stiles,” Derek’s hands tightened, and Stiles buried his nose in the crook of Derek’s neck and rutted against Derek faster, chasing him to finish as he stiffened and came between their stomachs.

Damn.

Stiles had gone completely boneless, and they hadn’t even fucked yet.

Best. Tour. Ever.

*

“Stiles.”

“Mmph. I’m busy having a lovely dream, so whoever that is can fuck off and die, _Scott_.” Stiles mumbled into his pillow, curling closer to the warm body next to him.

“I’m not Scott,” a familiar voice said, and woah, the voice was rumbling from under his ear.

“’Why’re you in my room th-” Stiles sat up suddenly, smacking his forehead into Derek’s chin. Right. Derek. He had spent the night with _Derek_. And was in _Derek’s_ room.

Also, ow, that hurt.

“Sorry,” Stiles said sheepishly, rubbing his forehead. “Did I hurt you?”

Derek shook his head and stretched out along the bed, sheet riding low across his hips and chest bare. He looked positively edible, and Stiles felt himself getting hard just _looking_.

Jesus, he felt like he was sixteen again.

“Don’t look at me like that,” Derek scowled, and Stiles knew he was fucked when the scowl just made him want to kiss Derek _more_.

“Why not?”

“Because I just woke you up so you’d have enough time to get upstairs before the students wake up, and you looking at me like _that_ will not end in you leaving any time soon.”

“Fuck, the students.” Stiles slumped back against Derek, who turned and nuzzled at Stiles’s throat.

“Mm, I’d rather you fuck their teacher,” he muttered against Stiles’s skin.

“Oh, look who grew a witty." Stiles poked Derek's cheek. "Cut it out with the nuzzling, I have to go get into uniform. No, seriously. What happened to kicking Stiles out of bed? I thought you were kicking Stiles out of bed. Though I can’t say I understand _why_ you’d want to kick Stiles out of bed.”

“I’m kicking Stiles out of bed for his own good. And stop talking about yourself in the third person. Or else.”

“Mm, bossy. I like it.” Stiles pushed at Derek’s head weakly and swung his legs over the side of the bed to stand up. He pulled on his jeans and shirt, then turned around to find Derek staring at him, still lounging against his bed.

“C’mere.”

“No way, dude. I come over there, I’m not leaving this room. I have to head back, because much as I like you, I also like my job. I'll see you at breakfast. In two hours.”

“Fine.”

Stiles assumed Derek meant ‘fine, go ahead and leave’, but apparently what he actually meant was ‘fine, allow me to _vault_ over my bed to catch you on your way out the door and kiss you senseless so that you look as thoroughly debauched as possible when you go to your hotel room and greet your best friend’.

Ten minutes later, said best friend did not look amused when Stiles opened the door to said hotel room.

“Where were you last night?” Scott asked heatedly.

“With Derek,” Stiles replied. He couldn’t help the dopey grin he was sure he had plastered across his face. After all, Project Frienduce had been a roaring success. Hell, it had been so successful it had _redefined_ successful.

“You look like you’ve been mauled.”

“Mmhmm.” Stiles agreed good-naturedly as he rifled through his duffle bag for a clean uniform shirt.

“At least you don’t have any hickeys. Dude, you could lose your job for this!”

“Nah, we were careful. Nobody saw us. And Derek won’t report me.”

“How do you know that? He reports _everyone_.”

“Yeah, because he _doesn’t_ want to sleep with them.” Stiles pointed out.

“But he wants to sleep with you?” Scott sounded surprisingly skeptical, given that he was supposedly Stiles’s best friend.  

“Uh, harsh, dude. I’m not _that_ undesirable.”

“I’m not saying you are! But he turns down desirable people all the time! He turned down Danny. And Lisa. And Eleanor.”

“Don’t forget Alexandra!” Stiles called cheerfully from the bathroom as he shimmied into his khakis.

“He turned down _Alexandra?_ ”

“I know, right?”

“Dude…” Scott looked far too concerned for someone who was supposed to be high-fiving Stiles right now.

“Look, Scott, can you be happy for me, please? Because I’m kind of freaking out on the inside. I majorly broke the rules last night, and I’m not even unhappy about it, because _I had sex with Derek Hale._ ”

Scott gave him a dopey look at that, half pity and half smile.

“Fine. But I’m not fistbumping you,” he insisted.

“Oh, you’re fistbumping me,” Stiles countered, holding out his fist. Scott rolled his eyes, but Stiles stood his ground until Scott relented. As soon as Scott did, Stiles tackled him into a hug that quickly devolved into a headlock.

“Trust me on this one, Scotty boy. What Derek and I have is kind of awesome. I can feel it. And even if it’s not, I’m a big boy. I can handle it, okay?”

Stiles didn’t let Scott have his head back until he agreed and called uncle.

Twice.

Hey, Stiles had to get his jollies somehow when Derek wasn’t around.

*

Stiles hadn’t been lying when he told Scott he could handle it. He could handle being around Derek without touching him.

Barely.

To distract himself from wanting to pet Derek’s face, Stiles spent all of breakfast undressing Derek in his mind. It was, quite expectedly, not the brightest move.

Lydia nudged him in the side, hard, and informed him that he was drooling over his oatmeal.

“It’s good oatmeal,” he protested. She patted his arm and nodded indulgently.

“Of course it is, sweetie.”

“Hey, no condescension before noon!”

“Play nice, children,” Erica drawled from across the table. Stiles stuck his tongue out at her.

Apparently after his professional conduct dam broke, it broke hard.

Stiles thanked his lucky stars that all he had to do after breakfast was load the kids onto the bus for the ride back home, because he had never felt more distracted in his life.

He could feel Derek watching him, and he was definitely watching back. The surreptitious glancing back and forth made for the longest seven-hour bus ride that Stiles had _ever_ sat through.

Erica noticed something was up around hour two.

Lydia informed them both that she knew something was up at breakfast.

Stiles just hoped none of the kids picked up on it, but most of them were slumped over their seats, sleeping. Stiles was counting the minutes until they were off of his bus and he was done being a guide for the week. 

Stiles exhaled audibly when they finally pulled up to the school, and the kids filed out to greet their waiting parents. After the last stragglers had been whisked off in their minivans, the bus driver asked Stiles if he'd like a ride to the bus depot.

“Where do you live?” Derek asked from his seat before Stiles could answer. Stiles rattled off his address.

“That’s near my place. I could give you a ride.” Derek’s voice was carefully casual, and Stiles couldn’t help but raise an eyebrow at him. Derek shrugged, his lips quirking.

“How generous of you, Mr. Hale.” Stiles fluttered his lashes mockingly.

“Shut up or I’ll take back the offer,” Derek grumbled. It only made Stiles smile harder.

“No, you won’t.” Stiles informed him cheerfully.

Derek may have glowered at him, but Stiles saw right past it. He followed Derek out to a black Camaro and climbed into the passenger seat. As soon as Derek shut the door, Stiles turned to face him.

“So. Who writes the performance reviews for your guides?” Stiles asked.

“Not me. Erica, I think. Maybe Lydia.”

“Good.”

“Why, afraid I’ll write something nasty?”

Stiles shook his head, grinning widely.

“Nope. Just glad that, as far as you’re concerned, I am no longer a tour guide. The kids are off, the bus has left, and school has ended. So you are not Mr. Hale and I am not Stiles the Guide. I’m just Stiles Stilinski, and Stiles Stilinski is just a dude in your car who could use a burger and some curly fries.”

“Derek Hale, just a guy who hates class trips and tour guides. Especially mouthy, persistent, irresistible ones.” Derek returned, turning the keys in the ignition. “Wanna grab a bite to eat?”

“Depends. D’you remember what you promised we’d do after you took me out?”

Derek grinned wolfishly and revved the engine.

*

The End

*

**Author's Note:**

> As an aside, because I am an incorrigible, unapologetic academic, Derek's 'thesis' was loosely based on the following sources:
> 
> Draheim, M. et al. (2011). The impact of information on students' beliefs and attitudes towards coyotes. Human Dimensions of Wildlife, 16:67-72. 
> 
> Karlsson, J & Sjöström, M. (2007). Human attitudes towards wolves, a matter of distance. Biological Conservation, 137:610-616.
> 
> Treves, A., Naughton-Treves, L. & Shelley, V. (2013). Longitudinal analysis of attitudes towards wolves. Conservation Biology, 27(2):315-323.


End file.
